The Asylum

by John Harwood

  “Uncle,” I said breathlessly, “if you will not allow Lucia to stay, then I must leave your house. I shall always be grateful to you for taking me in, but I have been very unhappy, and desperately lonely here, and without Lucia’s company, I can bear it no longer.”

  He sank back into his chair, with one hand pressed against his heart.

  “But, Georgina, what has possessed you? I had no idea you were unhappy. If you wished to take an afternoon off, you had only to say so. How will I manage without you? The orders . . . the parcels! How will I ever get out to a sale?”

  He looked and sounded so feeble that I feared he might collapse on the spot. If he does, I thought, I will be wholly to blame: I encouraged him to dismiss the boy, and I insisted upon helping in the shop; of course he has grown to depend upon me. But the thought of Lucia spurred me onward.

  “You managed perfectly well before, Uncle. We can easily find you someone else to do the parcels and mind the shop.”

  “But he would want to be paid! I cannot afford the expense!”

  “In that case, Uncle, you have only to agree that Lucia may live with us.”

  “Oh very well, very well, if you insist. But it is really most . . . most inconvenient.”

  “You will not be inconvenienced in the slightest, Uncle. Everything will be exactly the same.”

  “I do not see how, but I suppose I must put up with it.”

  He rose unsteadily to his feet and shuffled out of the room, leaving me shaken by my own boldness and wondering if I had grown callous and hard-hearted.

  Thursday, 12 October

  It is after midnight. Lucia is (or so I imagine) asleep in her room, which is already quite transformed; it is such a delight to have her here, and I know that she shares my feeling. Such a contrast to yesterday: Uncle was wounded and huffish all morning; then, as the afternoon dragged on and still Lucia did not return, I paced about the empty shop like a caged animal, imagining all sorts of catastrophes.

  When at last she appeared in the doorway, I confess I shed tears of joy, and then felt very ashamed of myself: she had woken very early and did not want to disturb me. She had been walking and thinking all day, she said, reliving her life as if it were someone else’s. Charlotte and I had aired her room and made up the bed, but she chose to spend one more night in the hotel, “to prove to myself that I am not afraid to be alone,” she said, “now that I know I don’t have to be.” I spent the evening composing a letter to Mr. Lovell, and tossed and turned most of the night . . . but she is here now, and safe, and that is all that matters.

  Wednesday, 18 October

  It is only a week since Lucia appeared in the shop, and already I cannot imagine life without her. The likeness astonishes me more every day. Uncle cannot tell us apart, and nor, I think, can Mrs. Eddowes; not that she would care. Lucia wears my clothes, having so few of her own apart from the gorgeous peacock gown; she is having two new dresses made in the same pattern as my own. When I teased her about it, she smiled and said, “Yes, I am a chameleon; I take on the colour of my surroundings.” We often wonder whether our mothers resembled each other as closely as we do, but without so much as a miniature between us, we can only speculate. Lucia is always constrained when she talks of “Mama”—the mother she remembers—whereas she will speculate freely about “Rosina,” as if they were quite separate beings. She finds my childhood inexhaustibly fascinating, and steers the conversation back to me at every opportunity. Mr. Lovell has not yet replied, so we have nothing more to go upon.

  Uncle is still being huffish and put upon with me (or with Lucia, when he confuses us—she takes it in very good part). I should never have promised him that everything would stay the same. He sighs ostentatiously at the smallest change to his routine, and reminds me at least twice a day that he is far too old to manage without me. I had selfishly imagined that Lucia and I would look after the shop together, but she prefers to walk alone in the afternoons. She is very tactful about it, but I can tell that she craves solitude in which to reflect. “It is like remembering two different lives at once,” she said yesterday, “and wondering which of them is mine,” but she will not be drawn beyond generalities.

  I worry about her wandering the city alone, with very little idea of where her feet are carrying her; she insists that she is not afraid of Thomas Wentworth—or anybody—but is she simply putting on a brave show for my sake? I cannot tell. I suspect she broods, as I would surely do in her place, over the dark strain in the Mordaunt blood, and whether it runs in her veins, but of course I dare not speak of that in case I am mistaken. Sometimes, when her face is shadowed, a chill comes over me, and I fear she would have been happier if we had never met.

  I understand completely why she needs this time alone; yet I long to be of more comfort to her: I would happily spend every waking—and sleeping—minute beside her. Every smile, every caress, every kiss, is precious to me: friends and cousins in novels are always kissing and embracing, but every evening—the time I most look forward to—when we embrace and say good night, I long to say, Come to bed with me, and let me hold you as I did that first night.

  On Sunday I summoned the courage to say, “Lucia, I know you suffer from nightmares; why don’t you stay with me, and then I can comfort you?” She smiled and caressed me, and seemed to hesitate before she replied, “Thank you, dearest cousin, but I’m sure I shall sleep soundly tonight.” I am afraid to ask her again, in case she should think—I am not even sure what. Is it wrong of me to feel as I do? Am I like Narcissus, falling in love with my own reflection?

  Thursday, 19 October

  Today, for once, Uncle Josiah did not go out; he was expecting one of his oldest clients, and said I might take the afternoon off. Lucia, to my delight, insisted that I accompany her. We walked up to Regent’s Park, arm in arm, and wandered around until we came upon a little grotto with a seat inside, just out of sight of the path. This, surely, was where Rosina and Felix Mordaunt had sat and talked. There was even a coffee stall nearby, kept by a wizened old man who said he had been there twenty-seven years, perhaps the very same one; it was like being served by a ghost.

  We took our tea back to the grotto and sat down on the bench, which was only just wide enough for two. Our shoulders were touching; I took my cup in my left hand so as not to jostle Lucia, and edged a little closer to her, until it came to me that this was how Rosina must have felt, sitting in this exact spot, with Felix Mordaunt beside her.

  “Have you ever been in love, Georgina?” said Lucia, as if she had read my thought.

  I started, almost spilling my tea, and blushed.

  “Not before—I mean, no, no, I haven’t.”

  “But do you think about marriage—do you long to be married, to have children?”

  “I don’t think I do, no. I—I don’t think I have a very high opinion of men. Our little household at Niton seemed very complete, even after Mama died. I knew when I was older that there was something I yearned for, and I vaguely assumed it must be marriage, but I have never met—never even seen a man I could imagine marrying. As for children, I know that I am supposed to long for them, but I don’t think I actually do; I can’t even imagine what it would feel like. I feel—I feel entirely content, sitting here with you.”

  I felt myself blushing even more.

  “And you, Lucia?”

  “Oh, I have fancied myself in love with various young men, but like you, I could never imagine marrying any of them. And I am accustomed to freedom, to making my own way in the world; I will not surrender that lightly. I wish I could live many lives, and be many different people; I should like to know what it feels like to be rich, to go to wonderful balls and banquets, and wear extravagant clothes, and be admired by everybody; but only for the experience: to walk on stage, so to speak, with the cream of society, play my part to perfection, and slip away again. Perhaps we shall do such things together, one day; it is what fascinates me about being an actress. But the theatre is so artificial, so mannered; I should
love to be an actress in real life. The secret of acting, I feel sure, is to become the person you mean to play; not simply pretend to be them, but to cast off your usual self as completely as you shed one costume and put on another.”

  “It sounds fascinating, but I have no talent for acting.”

  “I am sure you have. Your uncle is always saying he could not manage without you; let us prove him wrong by changing places for a day. I will be you, and do the parcels and mind the shop; you shall wear my peacock blue, and I shall make up your face a little—in the most delicate fashion—and I will wager that even Charlotte will not realise what we have done.”

  “Yes, let us try it,” I said, feeling my heartbeat quicken at the prospect. “What will you wager?”

  “What would you most like to win?”

  I longed to say, “Your heart,” but could only blush, and try to hide my face in my cup.

  “Perhaps you have won it already,” she said, touching my wrist with the tip of her gloved finger. “We shall change places tomorrow. And if we succeed, we shall not tell anyone, just yet; it will be another of our secrets.”

  Saturday, 21 October

  Lucia was right; Charlotte addressed me as “Miss Ardent” from the moment we came downstairs. Aunt Vida used to say that only vain, foolish women use powder and paint, but when Lucia allowed me to look in the glass, I confess I was very much taken with the result: she had made my eyes darker and more luminous, my eyebrows finer; my cheekbones more prominent, but so subtly that I could scarcely tell how it was done. And the peacock blue gown suited me to perfection. She had only watched me do the parcels once, but she carried it off flawlessly, sweetly turning aside my uncle’s peevishness. She even insisted that I should go out for the afternoon while she kept the shop; I would far rather have stayed, but she said firmly, “No, Lucia; it is very kind of you to offer, but you must have some time to yourself.”

  We continued to play each other even when we were alone; I found it extraordinarily exciting, and (in a brief lapse of concentration) told her so. “You see?” she replied. “It is just as I promised; that is the delight of acting. Of course, you and I are so alike that it is easy for us to change places. And now, Lucia . . .” I never contradict her when she says we are alike, because it pleases me, but—despite the extraordinary resemblance—I am not at all sure that we are alike. And yet I could not say how we differ. Lucia is still a mystery to me—I feel that she is opaque where I am transparent, and it is the mystery that fascinates me.

  When it came time for bed, we rose and embraced as usual, standing by the sitting-room fire—only not as usual, for she held me closer than ever before, and murmured, with her lips almost brushing my ear, “Lucia, why don’t you sleep with me tonight? Then I can comfort you if you have nightmares.”

  I was about to say, “Oh, Lucia, I should love to,” when I remembered that I was supposed to answer for her, not myself. My heart sank; the words died on my lips. Was she hoping I would say yes? Or subtly rebuking me for being too forward? I drew back, her hands still warm upon my shoulders. A faint, teasing smile flickered about her mouth; she regarded me as a teacher might regard a prize pupil faltering over a recitation.

  “Thank you, dearest cousin, but I’m sure I shall sleep soundly tonight.” Her smile broadened; I had won the prize, but lost what I most desired.

  “Good night, dearest cousin,” she said, drawing me close again, and adding, in a low, throaty whisper, “We shall make an actress of you yet.” Her lips brushed mine as she turned toward the door. But instead of crossing to the stairs, she turned right, and disappeared in the direction of my own room. A moment later I heard my door open and close.

  I was halfway down the stairs when I remembered my writing case. The key was around my neck—the chain is entirely hidden when I am dressed, so Lucia had not asked for it—but had I locked my journal away in the case, and put the case back in the drawer as usual, or was it lying on my writing table? Should I go up and make sure? But if I knocked, Lucia would think . . . She would think, at the very least, that I had something to hide. You always lock your journal away, I told myself. The reason you cannot remember is that you do it automatically. But I could not actually picture myself turning the key, and I hovered on the stairs for a long time before I went miserably on down to her room, where I lay awake most of the night, alternately tormenting myself by imagining what I had forfeited—perhaps she had wanted me to say yes, and was now lying awake in my bed, thinking that I did not want her—and enduring agonies of humiliation at the thought of her reading my journal. In the end I overslept, to find my bedroom empty, my writing case safely locked away, and Lucia already downstairs, back in her own character and behaving as if we had never so much as thought of impersonating each other.

  Monday, 23 October

  Mr. Lovell has replied at last, apologising for the delay: it seems that Mr. Wetherell has suffered another stroke, and retired from the practice, leaving Mr. Lovell in sole charge of his clients. Lucia and I were at breakfast when the letter arrived; she watched eagerly as I opened it, but her face fell as I began to read aloud:

  I deeply regret that your late mother’s instructions expressly prohibit me from forwarding the packet as you request. You say that your circumstances have changed in a way that makes it vital that you see the remaining papers; I wonder whether you could be more explicit about the nature of that change? I should add that the remainder of the bequest consists of a single sealed packet. Beyond the impression that it contains papers or documents, I know nothing of its contents. I think I may indicate, without exceeding my instructions, that in the event of your death—or certain other events, which I am forbidden to disclose—the packet is to be destroyed unopened. If you wish to instruct me on any other matter, I shall, of course, be honoured to act for you . . .

  “I suppose it was foolish of me to hope,” she said, with a look of desolation that pierced my heart.

  “You musn’t despair, Lucia. You shall see what is in that packet, if I have to engage a burglar to steal it from Mr. Lovell’s office. But we shan’t need a burglar; he is weakening, you can see. Inviting me to be more explicit: that is surely a hint. Lucia, we must tell him that we have met; I am certain that is what my mother intended.”

  “Perhaps you are right,” she said, “but I would feel happier if we had met him—so that I could feel sure of his discretion.”

  “Then let us go down to Plymouth and see him,” I said.

  “But your uncle—he will be most put out.”

  “Uncle Josiah will have to manage without us soon enough.”

  “But not like this; you must break it to him gently, for your own sake. And what does Mr. Lovell mean by ‘certain other events’? Your mother might have ordered him to destroy the packet if anyone else enquired about it . . . and there is another way. What is the point of your having a solicitor in Plymouth? Why don’t we find one here in London and ask Mr. Lovell to send the packet to him? A new man would be so much easier to persuade.”

  I had not thought of this. Her suggestion made obvious sense; yet all my instincts were against it.

  “But changing solicitors might be another of those ‘events,’” I said, trying to justify my reluctance. “Mr. Lovell wants to help us, I am sure of it. If I write to him and say—in the strictest confidence—that you and I have met, and that you are the daughter of Rosina Wentworth, who married Jules Ardent—what harm can come of that?”

  “I—I don’t know what it is I fear,” she said uneasily. “If only I could meet him, then I would know whether to trust him with my secret . . .”

  “But Lucia, we needn’t tell him. He doesn’t know what’s in the packet; as far as he is concerned, you are the legitimate daughter of Jules Ardent, who married Rosina Wentworth in France. Mama wouldn’t have told him any more than that.”

  “But what if we are wrong, and this is not the condition she laid down?”

  “Then I will go down to Plymouth and tell Mr. Lovell that I sh
an’t leave his office until he hands over the packet.”

  “You are right,” she said, taking a deep breath and lifting her chin. “I know I am being foolish—it is only that . . . Suppose I were to go to Plymouth in your place? Mr. Lovell has never met you, after all.”

  “But Lucia, he might want you to sign something—”

  “I am sure I could imitate your signature, if I practised a little.”

  “No, dearest, no, I won’t have it. If Mr. Lovell so much as suspected, he might destroy the papers; you could even be sent to prison. No, I will go down to see him—I need only be away one night—and, if you are sure you don’t mind, you can pretend to be me again, and then Uncle Josiah will have nothing to complain of. You are right: I must give him time to get used to the idea and find someone to help in the shop, but I mean to tell him as soon as I return from Plymouth. And I promise you, Lucia, if I have the slightest reservation about Mr. Lovell, he will never know of your existence.”

  “But then how will you persuade him to hand over the packet?”

  “You mustn’t fret, Lucia. Mr. Lovell wants to help us; I feel it in my bones. I promise I shan’t return empty-handed.”

  Her face was still troubled, but I had confidence enough for two, and my letter to Mr. Lovell was in the post an hour later.

  Wednesday, 25 October

  Mr. Lovell has replied by return; a good omen. My appointment is for two o’clock on Monday. He even advises about trains, and recommends Dawlish’s Private Hotel, which is only fifty yards from his office. I had hoped to return that night, but the London express leaves Plymouth at four forty-two, and I cannot be sure of catching it; it may take more than one visit to persuade him.